The Way to a Monkey's Heart
by SheepiChan
Summary: [One-Shot!] Sanzo tries to do something special for Goku's birthday... what could possibly go wrong?


GYAAH! Damn this Quick Edit...:eats it:

(A/N): XD You'd think that I'd be working on "Hakuryuu's First Christmas" or on some other fic right now…

Well… Guess what? Nyaah! Instead, I'm writing this ONE SHOT (Yes! One shot! I'm gonna keep to my original plans this time! I promise!) as a dedication to our favorite little saru's birthday! With a totally cliché idea no less! X3

Quick warning! There may be some OOC-ness… if so, I apologize! Truly!

That being said, it's time for the official stuff, and then on to this poor excuse of a fic!

Rating: K+-T For Sanzo's icky mouth

Setting: Gensoumaden Saiyuki

Disclaimer: My penname is not Kazuya Minekura, so therefore I do not own Saiyuki. Be grateful for that!

The Way to a Monkey's Heart

He would not ask for help.

No way in the seven hells would he ask for help.

After all… he is Genjo Sanzo. And Genjo Sanzo _never_ needs help.

Or at least, never _admits _to needing it.

Hakkai's kitchen, once so clean that one could see their reflection gazing back at them from just about any smooth surface, was now painted with cake batter.

Batter on the walls.

Batter on the counter.

Batter on the ceiling.

_Now how the hell did that get up there? _Sanzo thought as he quickly glanced upwards. Shrugging the matter off, he bent over the half full bowl of just finished mix. The floral pattern bandanna that he wore to keep his hair back slid over his eyes. Growling in annoyance, he pushed it back up for what seemed to be the twentieth time in a mere five minutes._ How can Hakkai stand wearing this damned thing?_ spiteful thoughts crowded his mind, as usual.

"No!" Sanzo chastised himself, and shook his head to clear away any not-so-friendly feelings, "Hakkai said that in order to make something good, I need to have happy thoughts…" milliseconds after the words escaped his mouth, Sanzo realized the total idiocy of that statement. Him and happy thoughts? Together? Hah!

Once his head was clear, a conveniently-timed flashback moved right in. Sanzo allowed it, recollecting a simple event that happened only days before.

* * *

Sanzo sat at his desk, face in hand, and bored as all hell. Giving into his boredom, he put aside his steadily increasing paperwork and opened a drawer. Quickly looking around and making sure nobody was there, he pulled out a calendar book that Goku had given him for his birthday a few months earlier.

He flipped through it, not looking at anything in particular, when a red mark caught his eye. He read the note, and nearly dropped the book in shock.

How could he have forgotten!

Sanzo slammed the book closed and tossed it back into the drawer, which he also slammed shut. He slammed it over and over again, working out his frustration, and trying to help himself think.

SLAM!

SLAM!

He was on his thirty first slam, when it came to him. By the time he reached the thirty ninth slam, Sanzo was on the phone with Hakkai, making plans.

SLAM!

"…So yeah… it's coming up and… well…" Sanzo tapped his finger on his desk, unbelieving what he was about to ask.

"You want to use my kitchen." Hakkai's voice rang sweetly on the other end.

"…Eh… yeah…" Sanzo shifted his eyes back and forth quickly, only comfortable enough to continue when he saw no sign of movement, "And… uh… Hakkai?"

"Yes, Sanzo?"

"…Don't tell Gojyo…"

A pause, then a chuckle, "Of course not, Sanzo."

Sanzo slammed the drawer again, however this time in a sense of victory.

Later on, the desk would file a suit against Sanzo for repeated and quite uncalled for abuse.

* * *

The corrupted monk sighed and wiped his batter covered hands on Hakkai's bandanna matching apron. Normally, Sanzo would be much more sophisticated than resorting to smearing goo onto himself, but there was no time for formalities.

And this was no time for being normal. (Well, as normal as Sanzo could be… which isn't very much…)

For it was Goku's birthday, and Sanzo wanted it to go as well as possible.

He exhaled again, and strode to the bags of fruits that be brought along with him. Picking out a couple choice bananas and mangos, he lay them on a cutting board, a knife soon following.

Sanzo grabbed a tiny slip of paper that Hakkai left him. On it Hakkai wrote, in his neat, prim handwriting, directions on how to create a wonderful fruitcake. Not the rock hard kind, as that was only for professionals, but a sweet fluffy type that even novices could accomplish. _Cut each slice evenly…_ he read to himself silently. He rolled his eyes, _Geez. Thanks, Hakkai. I never would have figured _that _out… I told him that I didn't need his help._ Sanzo crumpled up the paper and threw it away, smirking smugly the whole time. Face it, Genjo Sanzo just never needs help. He glided back to the counter, grabbed the knife, and lifted it up, "…Eat blade, fruit." he then proceeded to chop the bananas, unaware of the excruciating pain he was causing them.

Sanzo placed a layer of evenly diced bananas at the bottom of a pan, and then poured a layer of thick batter over them. Another layer of banana… then another layer of sweet smelling goo…

Banana.

Goo.

Banana.

Goo.

"Now for the mango." Sanzo pulled the mangoes onto the cutting board, his knife, already covered with banana residue, held at the ready. He was about to slice downward when-

BRRRING!

"Huh?" Sanzo's attention fell away from the knife for a split second. The knife continued its downward course towards what should have been fruit.

CHOP!

"ARRGH! MOTHER FU-GAAH!"

Apparently it missed its target.

Sanzo's hoarse bellow rose over the piercing shriek of the kitchen phone. He instinctively dropped the knife onto the countertop, his hand flying up at a remarkable speed to insert his injured finger into his mouth. Doing so knocked a stray banana peel onto the floor, although Sanzo was too busy nursing his wound to notice, or care for that matter.

Removing his finger from his mouth, Sanzo wrapped a towel around it tightly as a makeshift bandage until he could find a real one. Throughout all this, the phone continued ringing shrilly, grating on whatever nerves Sanzo still possessed.

BRRRING!

"Shut up!" he roared at the innocent phone.

BRRRING!

"Shut up! Shut up! _Shut up_!" he moved around frantically. Where did Hakkai keep the bandages!

BRRRING!

"SHUT THE FU-AAAAH!"

CRASH!

Sanzo disappeared from sight as the neglected banana peel made itself known, at the cost of Sanzo's footing. The blonde fell right onto his back, his semi nonexistent backside taking the brunt of the fall. He didn't even bother to move, and stared straight up at the ceiling, wondering yet again how he managed to get batter up there. Vibrations from the landing knocked the cordless phone from the counter, and right next to Sanzo's ear on the floor. The monk didn't even have to reach out, and just spoke towards the ceiling.

"…Hello."

"Hello? Sanzo?" a familiar voice called out.

"…Yes. What is it, Hakkai?" Sanzo answered, oddly calm.

"Well, I just called to see how things were going." Hakkai's tone lowered, signaling that Goku and Gojyo were near. Sure enough, Sanzo could make out their laughter in the background. In order to give Sanzo the privacy he needed to complete his gift, Hakkai offered to take Goku out to a nearby fair as a birthday treat, and to drag Gojyo along too.

"…Things couldn't be better…" Sanzo remarked dryly.

Hakkai didn't seem to catch the sarcasm, "Alright then! In that case, we should be back in… oh, about two hours."

"…Splendid…"

"Uhm… okay then… _ciao_!" the line clicked off.

Sanzo lay there for a good fifteen minutes. Although the majority of the pain subsided, his butt still throbbed sluggishly. Finally finding the will to continue his cake abomination, he brought himself up, clutching a banana peel in one hand, and the phone in the other.

He threw them both out.

* * *

"Now that the stupid thing's preheated… I guess I just throw the cake in…" Sanzo muttered to himself as he slipped on a pair of oven mitts, wary of his newly bandaged finger the whole time. Grasping the cake pan, he slipped it inside the stove gently to avoid both spill and burn. He closed the oven door and pressed a couple of buttons. 

Nodding in accomplishment he flopped down into a chair, sighing heavily. Now that everything's over and done with, there was only one thing left to do.

Sanzo reached over and snatched the newspaper off the table. He opened to a random page and began to read.

Nothing but the same old boring stories… Muggings… Car thefts… Fires… the same things over and over. His eyelids began to feel heavy and he yawned.

_…It wouldn't hurt if I just took a short nap… _he reasoned._ After all, I have the timer on… so it'll ring when it's ready._

And with that, the monk slowly nodded off to sleep.

* * *

Sanzo's nose twitched at the smell of smoke. Even with his eyes protected by the tight squeezing of his eyelids, they still burned. 

_Nnn… is that stupid_ kappa _trying to cook again…?_ he stirred in his slumber, and toppled right off the chair.

WUMPH!

Sanzo jumped. He coughed as his head became surrounded my smoke, "W-what!" he ran to the stove, pinpointing that as the place from where the smoke was billowing. That stupid timer never went off!

"Shit!" Sanzo jammed his hands into the mitts, his bandage ripped off his finger and his wound reopened.

However, at the moment, he failed miserably in giving a damn.

Jerking open the oven door, he shielded his face from the expulsion of smoke, heat and flames._…Flames!_ Sanzo's mouth gaped. Somehow, his cake, his perfect cake, his perfect cake for the monkey he cared so much for (but never 'fessed up to it) had caught fire.

Was that even possible?

Sanzo abandoned all reason and grasped the hot metal firmly. He hissed in pain as the extreme heat stung him straight through the mittens. Keeping a firm hold, he rushed the pan over to the sink, setting it down for a moment to turn on the faucet.

That moment was all it took for the flames to leap onto the apron that Sanzo adorned.

"SHIT!" Sanzo tore off the apron and threw it to the floor. He raised a foot to stomp it out…

…but not before the flames leapt onto the very chair that he had been sleeping on only minutes before.

_But how! The damn thing's legs are made out of _steel!

The flames didn't seem to care one bit as they ate the chair and made their way to the table.

The smoke alarm decided that now was as good a time as ever to start blaring.

BLEEP! BLEEP! BLEEP! BLEEP!

"I know!" Sanzo shouted at the alarm, rushing to find the fire extinguisher. Finding it in the laundry room, he bounded back to the kitchen.

Only to find that the fire had nearly gutted the entire room.

BLEEP! BLEEP! BLEEP! BLEEP!

"Stop it, already!" Sanzo cried out.

BRRING!

From inside the wastebasket, the phone started to ring.

"Gods! Make it stop!" Sanzo dropped to his knees and grabbed his head.

"Sanzo!" a voice cried from the phone.

"Go away! Just stop!"

"Sanzo!" the voice persisted.

"Please…" Sanzo nearly begged. The world around him blurred and swam.

* * *

"Sanzo! Wake up! Sanzo!" 

Sanzo bolted up, his breathing haggard as he clutched his blankets. Something flew backwards from the corner of his eye.

"S-Sanzo?" a pair of wide golden eyes peered at him from the floor at his bedside, concerned brows furrowed, "Are you okay? …You were havin' some kinda nightmare…"

_A dream…_ Sanzo flopped back onto his pillow, "It… it was just a dream…" he murmured, bringing a hand to his forehead, wiping away the small beads of sweat gathered at the surface. He tried to get his breathing back to normal, more embarrassed than anything that he lost control like that.

Goku propped himself on his elbows, "…You okay?"

"…Yeah. I'm fine." Sanzo swallowed before continuing so his voice wouldn't crack, "…Goku?"

"Yes Sanzo?"

"Your birthday… is it today?"

Goku nodded eagerly, "Yup! You said that we were gonna go to Hakkai's to celebrate!" his round cheeks bunched up in a wide grin as he added, "You also said you had a surprise waitin' for me!"

"No!" Sanzo leapt from his laying position.

Goku's eyes widened partly with shock, and partly with disappointment.

"No," the monk spoke gentler, "I'm going to call Hakkai, and tell him and Gojyo to come here instead." His softer tone seemed to quell the monkey at least somewhat.

"What for, Sanzo?"

"…A change of plans."

* * *

(A/N): And that's the end! 

I hafta admit… the story didn't really go the way I had planned it to… XD; It really just sparked a life of its own…

I hope it's enjoyable! Any and all critique is very much appreciated!

Ja!

Sheepi


End file.
